'Well, I don't know about these two but for me it's both,' Suzanne said, a frown crinkling her otherwise smooth brow.
Pulling out a chair Lasser sat down. 'Right, ladies, what can I do for you?'
Suzanne looked at the woman at her side, who met her gaze before sighing heavily. 'My name is Claire Oxbury. I don't know if Medea's told you but I work at Wrightington Hospital?'
'She did mention it.'
'So you know I spent a lot of time with Robert Flynn?'
'I'm listening.'
Claire began to look uncomfortable. 'I believe you came up to the hospital to have a word with Doctor Dawes?'
'Well yeah, though to be honest it was a wasted journey. According to Dawes, Flynn has been nothing but the model patient from start to finish.'
He watched as the blush crept up from her starched collar to infuse her face.
'I take it Mr Dawes was being economical with the truth?'
Oxbury shook her head, 'Not as such.'
Lasser could see Medea watching him from the corner of his eye; he looked across the table at Suzanne who raised a perfectly-plucked eyebrow.
'I'm sorry, you've lost me,' he said.
Picking up her glass, Claire took a quick sip before placing it back on the table. 'Robert Flynn has never shown violent tendencies, but he's a very troubled individual.'
'Forgive me but I think we've already reached that conclusion.'
He heard Media sigh and bit his tongue.
'Did Dawes tell you about Robert's mother?' Claire asked.
'He said she'd been murdered and that they never found the man responsible, he also said that Flynn didn't tell the authorities about her death.'
'Why would he keep something so horrific like that to himself? Suzanne asked.
Claire straightened her shoulders and crossed her legs. Here we go, Lasser thought, she's switching to shrink mode.
'For years Robert was forced to share his mother with a string of anonymous men. She had serious mental health problems of her own and word got out that she was always willing to entertain, if you know what I mean?'
Suzanne grimaced. 'So she was a prostitute, is that what you're saying?'
'Not in the conventional sense, money rarely changed hands. She was a damaged individual and people took advantage of that fact.'
'That's awful,' Medea leaned forward in her seat, her face etched with concern.
'Complete strangers would turn up on her doorstep and she would have sex with them. Some left her a bit of money, others it was cigarettes but the majority just took what they wanted and left.'
'And Robert knew what was going on?' Medea asked.
Lasser could see the pity in her eyes and sighed. 'This is all very distressing but we have four dead people and two in hospital with life-threatening injuries so don't expect too much sympathy from this department.'
Suzanne shook her head and gave Lasser a weary smile. 'Believe it or not, Claire, Lasser is one of the good guys. I mean, I used to think he was a hard-faced sod but he's like Alan, underneath all the vitriol and bile beats a heart of gold.'
Lasser eased back in his chair, flabbergasted. 'I hope that's meant as some kind of compliment?'
She smiled, 'Absolutely.'
'Wow, my own groupies.'
Medea punched him lightly on the arm. 'Don't push your luck, sweetheart.'
'OK, I get it, Flynn had a crappy start in life, but we already know all this.'
'It took him over six months before he would even discuss his mother.' Claire said. 'The whole episode was highly painful for him; he'd spent years constructing barriers to keep out the memories.'
'Tell me, what were his views on women?' Lasser asked.
'Well, there's no doubt he loved his mother but her behaviour was very confusing for a young child. With regards to other women, he seemed to have a high regard for the opposite sex. In my dealings with him, he was always courteous, never threatening. In fact, if circumstances had been different, he would have made an ideal partner for someone.'
Lasser ran a hand across his face. 'So, either something happened to change his opinion of women or he was a sly bastard who managed to pull the wool over your eyes.'
Claire raised an eyebrow. 'That's perfectly possible, Sergeant, I know you probably think what I do is a waste of time…'
'I never said that.'
She smiled and nodded. 'I was going to say in some cases you're right, we can get fooled. All I can point to is Robert's lack of a criminal record and the fact that I spent several months getting to know him. I believe something must have triggered emotions buried very deep to set him off along this path of violence.'
'OK, fair enough, I'll buy that, but you're still not telling me anything that really matters.'
Rain dripped from the large umbrella covering the table, pattering onto the patio flags. 'Twelve months into therapy, Robert started to talk about the men that used to visit the house.'
'The punters?'
Medea scowled, Suzanne sighed heavily. Lasser chose to ignore them both.
'Some individuals would call regularly and of course situations like this inevitably follow a certain path…'
'What do you mean?' Medea asked.
Claire took another sip of wine, before licking her glossy lips. 'One man turns up and then he tells a friend and suddenly it's two and then before you know it groups of men. All those male egos egging one another on to go further to be more extreme and suddenly the woman ceases to be a real person and becomes a mere object.' She stopped and looked at Lasser. 'Did Dawes tell you about Robert being raped?'
Suzanne's hand shot out in shock and caught the glass. 'Shit!' she made a grab for it and missed, the empty vessel rolled off the end of the table and shattered onto the flags. Medea covered her mouth in shock.
'He mentioned it,' Lasser replied with a frown.
'He was raped,' Medea gasped.
'By four men,' Claire said.
As far as Laser was concerned, she was playing to the gallery.
'Jesus.' Suzanne said in a shocked voice.
Lasser turned to Medea, his temper unravelling. 'Remember, Tommy Grieves do you, the nice old guy we had a drink with?' He saw the colour flood her face and felt like a bastard.
'Who?' Claire asked.
'Oh, he's nothing for you to worry about, just some old wino who was trying to get some sleep in a cardboard box…'
'The man in the churchyard?' Suzanne interrupted.
'Yeah, and Marsha Rimmer, eighteen, and stabbed fourteen times in the head and neck. Oh and by the way she happened to be a virgin and I bet she never imagined losing it would cost her life.'
He looked at the women; Medea had such empathy and sorrow in her eyes that he had to turn away. Suzanne swallowed and lowered her head.
'I know Flynn has been treated like shit but don't forget about the victims, the ones he's murdered.'
Claire watched him through narrowed eyes. 'I can only tell you the facts. Robert Flynn was an innocent, as was his mother, neither of them asked to be abused.'
Lasser suddenly felt Medea's hand slide into his and sighed. 'OK, I'm not here to have a go, but can we please get to the point?'
Suzanne pushed the shards of glass to one side with the sole of her shoe, the sound sharp and brittle.
'Like I said, Robert, began to talk about the men who came to visit. He never knew their names but he could recognise their faces and one in particular stuck in his mind.'
Lasser narrowed his eyes; they were coming to the crux of the matter. Claire started to look uncomfortable again. 'Go on,' he said.
'According to Robert, he was the man responsible for the death of his mother.'
Lasser slid his elbows onto the table. 'So, this man had been to the house more than once?'
'According to Robert he used to come every week, sometimes twice.'
'And he gave you a description?'
Claire nodded.
'Have you passed it onto the police?'
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As soon as he saw the look on her face, he knew the answer. 'That's why I'm here,' she said in a low voice.
'And how long ago was it, when he described this mystery man?'
'Eight, maybe nine months.'
Lasser sighed. 'And why did you decide to keep it to yourself?'
Claire pulled her thin coat tight around her shoulders. 'I didn't keep it to myself, I could have done. Patient confidentiality is something I take very seriously, Sergeant.'
'So who did you confide in?'
He watched as she nibbled at her lower lip her eyes agitated. 'Doctor Dawes.'
'And what was his response?'
'He thought it ridiculous.'
'Hang on, Flynn gives you a description of the man he says murdered his mother and you take that information to the head of your department?'
'That's correct.'
'Well look, I realise the killing happened ten, twelve years ago?'
'Actually it was fourteen.'
'Right, but that still doesn't explain why your boss would dismiss it as ''ridiculous''.'
He could see the colour flaring back into her cheeks, a cautious look in her eyes. 'Robert said that the man who came to the house wasn't just a random individual,' she paused and tugged at her wedding ring. 'He said he was her doctor,' she looked away as if the thought was preposterous.
Lasser could feel his head begin to thrum like a distant engine rumbling slowly to life. 'So the man treating her for her illness was actually abusing her?'
'According to Robert, yes.'
'Why was Dawes so adamant that it couldn't be true?'
Oxbury carried on as if she hadn't heard the question. 'After Robert told me, I started to make a few inquiries, I wanted to know if any of it was possible.'
'And what did you find out?' Lasser could feel the tension beneath the umbrella building, the rain falling so hard now that it was forming large puddles on the close-cropped lawn.
'At the time of her death, Robert's mother was being seen regularly by a doctor…'
'His name, Claire, what was his name?'
For a few seconds she didn't answer then she sighed and straightened her shoulders. 'His name was Fleming.'
Lasser rocked back in his chair. 'Fleming!'
'You've heard of him?' Claire asked, her eyes wary.
'Heard of him, I've interviewed the bugger,' yanking out his cigarettes he sparked one into life. 'Tell me, did you go to Dawes before or after you found out the name?'
Her eyes were on the move again, Suzanne reached out a hand and placed it on Claire's arm. 'Tell him, Claire.'
'After.'
'I can take it that Dawes and Fleming know one another?' Lasser tried to keep the sneer from his voice and failed.
Claire nodded. 'When he was younger, Dawes used to work at Leigh, Fleming was his boss.'
'I don't believe this.'
'Look, I'm sorry, maybe I should have come to you sooner, but I didn't know what to do. I mean, I still don't know if it explains any of this. Robert was always adamant that he never knew the man's name and he said he'd never seen him since his mother's death…'
'Do you know if Fleming was ever questioned about the death?'
'I tried to find out, though to be honest I didn't know where to start and when I mentioned it to Dawes he became furious…'
'Because you'd been digging the dirt?'
'He made it plain that I was running the risk of ruining the reputation of a man who'd spent his working life looking after the weak and vulnerable.'
'Yeah well, so did Jimmy Savile.'
Just then, they heard the side gate creak open. Lasser turned to find Bannister standing in the gap, pissed wet through, face like a slapped arse. 'Enjoying yourself are you, Lasser? I see you've got the wine out, well that didn't take you long did it!'
Suzanne stood up. 'Alan, shut up and sit down you need to hear this.'
Bannister's mouth flapped open; his eyes wide in shock, a drop of rain slid from the end of his nose.
Lasser grinned. 'Here you are, you can have my chair.'
Bannister shook with rage, his face fractious.
'Remember your blood pressure,' Suzanne warned.
Bannister tilted his head to the sky, his hands locked into fists, then his shoulders slumped and he sighed in desperation.
111
Shaun knew exactly where to go, he remembered talking to Fleming for hours, going over the same stuff. His time in Afghanistan, the things he'd seen, the things he'd done, over and over until he thought his brain would crack in two. At first, Fleming had seemed like an OK guy, compassionate and keen to help. However, as time progressed Shaun had begun to have doubts about the man. The way in which he would want to revisit certain parts of Shaun's past and it always seemed to be the ones that included the most violence and suffering.
Though being in the military had conditioned him to taking orders from experts, it was all part of being a first-rate soldier. Fleming was a specialist so you showed him respect and did as he asked. Though eventually, Shaun had started to resent going to the shrink, it seemed to cause more problems than it solved. He remembered the couple of times Gemma had been to pick him up and there had been something about Fleming's demeanour that Shaun didn't like, as if he found her attractive but also inferior in some way.
That's how he knew that Fleming was going to live on a boat, he'd brought it up at their last meeting a few days before his retirement. Gemma had said it sounded wonderful and he'd smiled at her, though his eyes had remained blank as if the smile was merely a practiced reflex action. He told them he'd already bought the boat and a permanent mooring at Red Rock, then he'd clapped Shaun on the back and told him to take care before walking back into the hospital.
Shaun had never been back, they'd sent him appointments and then reminders. When he failed to keep them he'd received a letter stating that he was no longer a patient and should he need further help then he'd have to go through his GP to get a referral.
It seemed like a lifetime ago, as if the whole experience had happened to someone else. Shaun thought about Flynn and pondered the ramifications of his confessions, the trouble was could he trust the word of a man who was clearly insane.
Pushing through a snarl of brambles, he wiped a hand across his brow; the canal lay before him, the water choppy in the stiffening breeze. Adjusting the backpack, he turned right and began to jog along the towpath. It would take him an hour to get to Red Rock and then at least another forty-five minutes to reach Borsdane woods to retrieve the tablets for Flynn.
Pulling out the tobacco pouch, he stopped to roll a cigarette and wondered why he hadn't simply killed Robert Flynn. Could it be that he was attempting to put off the inevitable, with Flynn dead what reason would he have to carry on living. Shaun grimaced and spat a sliver of tobacco from his bottom lip. If that were the case then it meant he was a coward, looking for lame excuses to carry on breathing.
Flicking up the hood of his jacket, he set off walking, a minute later; he broke into a run, desperate to escape the painful truth.
112
Cathy pulled the duvet over her head and tried to get some sleep, her mind full of cluttered thought. Seeing Lasser again had left her shattered, since the split up she'd tried to move on with her life, tried to concentrate on her career and to a large extent it had worked, at least she thought it had.
Throwing back the cover, she sat up and looked around the strange bedroom. The moment she'd laid eyes on him all the old emotions had come flooding back accompanied by a torrent of unwanted memories.
When Sally Wright had told her that Lasser was seeing someone else the news had hit her like a wrecking ball. It was as if she'd convinced herself that eventually they'd get back together. After all, the times they'd shared had been good, she thought back to the nights when they would curl together in front of the fire and talk, she could see him looking at her with adoration in his eyes.
Cathy rose from the bed before stalking over to
the window. Now he was with someone else and although she'd joked about it, she knew that Lasser had been telling the truth when he said he was a one-girl guy, sighing, she wiped a hand down the windowpane.
She should never have come back. It's not as if anyone had forced her into it. She'd volunteered, because she'd wanted to see him again and now it had all backfired. Once again, she found herself in a situation over which she had no control. There was a maniac out there, seemingly killing at will and she was powerless to do anything about it, and now to top it off the man she still loved had moved on.
Screwing up her eyes, she folded her arms and sighed, trying to work out where it had all gone wrong. Two years earlier a young thug had attacked her down a snow-covered alleyway and she'd been fortunate to escape with cuts and bruises, though the mental scars had run deeper than she had been prepared to admit. In blind panic, she'd cut Lasser from her life and moved back to the town where she was raised. Only now was she was beginning to realise her mistake. She should have stayed and talked to him about how she'd felt, explained her fear. The worst part was she knew Lasser would have supported her; he would have done anything to ease her pain. Turning from the window, she made her way across the room and sat on the edge of the bed. Part of her wanted to try and break up this new relationship, to make Lasser realise that they should be together, though she knew she never would.
She'd made her choice and would have to learn to live with it, though the sooner they caught Robert Flynn the sooner she'd be able to leave the town and lick her wounds.
She sniffed and wiped the tear from her cheek. Cathy thought back to their time in the car, she could recall the anguish in his eyes and if she'd pushed then maybe his resolve would have crumbled. Perhaps he would have fallen into her arms, but she was astute enough to know that she would have felt terrible in the process. That was one of drawbacks of having a conscience.
113
'Robert, listen to me, you have to keep moving your hands.' The voice was back and Robert felt elated and terrified.
'But it hurts,' he whimpered.
'I know it does, but you have to try.'
It had started to rain again and Robert could feel the cold set up home in his bones, the left side of his head pulsated with pain. 'I can't, it…'
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